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      The killing of aid workers adds to pressure on the UK government to halt arms sales to Israel

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      Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster email Britain’s main opposition parties demanded Wednesday that the Conservative government publish legal advice it has received on whether Israel has broken international humanitarian law during the war in Gaza. They say the U.K. should ban weapons sales to Israel if the law has been broken.Britain is a staunch ally of Israel, but relations have been tested by the mounting death toll of the almost six-month war. Calls for an end to arms exports have escalated since an Israeli airstrike killed seven aid workers from World Central Kitchen, three of them British.David Lammy, foreign affairs spokesman for the main opposition Labour Party, said “there are very serious accusations that Israel has breached international law.”He urged the government to “publish the legal advice now.”“If it says there is a clear risk that U.K. arms might be used in a serious breach of international humanitarian law, it’s time to suspend the sale of those arms,” Lammy told British broadcastersLondon Mayor Sadiq Khan, one of the country’s most senior Labour officials, said “I don’t understand any justification for not publishing the legal advice that they’ve got.”“It’s important they publish that legal advice so that we can have confidence that the British government is following international law as well,” Khan told reporters in London.Two smaller opposition parties, the centrist Liberal Democrats and secessionist Scottish National Party, called on the government to halt arms sales to Israel.Prime Minister Rishi Sunak did not commit to publishing the legal advice, but said the U.K. followed a strict “set of rules, regulations and procedures” over licensing arms exports.“I have been consistently clear with Prime Minister (Benjamin) Netanyahu since the start of this conflict that while of course we defend Israel’s right to defend itself and its people against attacks from Hamas, they have to do that in accordance with international humanitarian law, protect civilian lives — and sadly too many civilians have already lost their lives,” Sunak told The Sun newspaper’s politics podcast. More

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      Ex-Post Office CEO Paula Vennells knew of hack two years before denial to parliament, tapes reveal

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      Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailPaula Vennells, the former Post Office chief executive, may have been told about a “covert operations team” that could remotely access the Horizon system and adjust branches’ accounts two years before she appeared in parliament.In newly surfaced allegations Ms Vennells was briefed by the Post Office’s general counsel that a unit in Bracknell’s Fujitsu headquarters could access subpostmaster’s accounts remotely.Tapes obtained by Channel 4 show the Post Office’s chief lawyer Susan Crichton confirming twice that Ms Vennells was aware of the allegations.In the audio recording – dating from 2013 – Ms Crichton can be heard saying:“[Paula] knows about the allegation. She knows we are working on it.”She added: “She’s got everything. The way that I’ve tried to brief Paula is, as soon as I have evidence that, you know, that there is a problem, she knows about it the next minute”. Former Post Office boss Paula Vennells has forfeited her CBE after public dissatisfaction with her role in the Horizon scandal The recording is from two years prior to the Post Office halting prosecutions against its own sub-postmasters, and two years before the former chief executive told MPs in 2015 that it was not possible for subpostmasters’ accounts to be accessed remotely.In written evidence to the Business, Innovation and Skills Committee Inquiry, the Post Office said: “There is no functionality in Horizon for either a branch, Post Office or Fujitsu to edit, manipulate or remove transaction data once it has been recorded in a branch’s accounts.”More than 700 branch managers around the UK were prosecuted by the Post Office between 1999 and 2015 when the faulty Horizon accounting software made it look as though money was missing from their shops.Evidence of possible remote access to the Horizon system by Fujitsu operatives has been central to the ongoing Post Office scandal.The newly uncovered tapes come from a call on which investigators from forensic accountancy firm Second Sight, along with several Post Office executives, were present.Michael Rudkin, a former Post Office union official, who was central to the discovery of Fujitsu’s covert operations unit was also referenced on the call.In the tape Ron Warmington, a representative from Second Sight, warns that Ms Vennells could be questioned by Lord Arbuthnot – who campaigned on behalf of sub-postmasters – on the Bracknell operation.“If James says something like, ‘And where are you on this assertion about the Bracknell covert operations team, as it was referred to by Rudkin?’,” Warmington asks.“Well look, that’s a specific case. We’ll come back to it when we finish the investigation,” Ms Crichton responds.“Yeah, well, as long as she doesn’t come back and say, ‘Look, so what’s this Bracknell issue, what is he talking about?’; ‘Oh, we’ve known about that for two months’,” Mr Warmington probes.“She knows about the allegation. She knows we are working on it,” Ms Crichton responds.Hundreds of subpostmasters were wrongly convicted of stealing after the Post Office’s Horizon accounting system made it appear as though money was missing at their branches (Yui Mok/PA)The tapes also reveal that lawyers were eager to shut down interest from MPs into the unfolding scandal. In the audio, the Post Office lawyer is heard saying: “The need to somehow have a plan to close down this process. I mean, even to the extent of stopping MPs sending cases in now. So how do we close down the MP side of the process. And what would work for MPs? And what can we sell to MPs? And how quickly can we do that?”She continues: “So is there any way, and I’m thinking out loud here, is there any way of shutting down the MP cases, and making James and his friends happy, so they’ll just go away basically?”Former union employee Mr Rudkin told Channel 4 that the tapes went some way to confirming what he had always known: “The minute I first heard it, it was one of elation saying ‘Rudkin you were right!’. The second one is one of sadness thinking ‘Why did my wife and kids have to be put through this”He continued: “It’s not just us that’s affected. It’s the whole family. The way that you are shunned within the local community – whispers, ‘No smoke without fire’. Susan’s reputation and mine for that matter, just dragged through the mire. “And I can’t understand for the life of me why it’s taking so long for the Metropolitan Police to get on top of this. Somebody’s got to be held to account”.Susan Crichton and Paula Vennells did not respond to Channel 4 News’ requests for comment.A Post Office spokesperson said: “We remain fully focused on getting to the truth of what happened and supporting the statutory Public Inquiry, which is chaired by a judge with the power to question witnesses under oath, and is therefore best placed to help achieve this.”Fujitsu has been contacted for comment. More

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      Identities of seven aid workers killed by Israeli strike in Gaza revealed as Sunak demands investigation

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      For free real time breaking news alerts sent straight to your inbox sign up to our breaking news emailsSign up to our free breaking news emailsAll seven aid worker “heroes” with World Central Kitchen killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on Monday have been identified. The humanitarian group, which delivers food aid to war and disaster zones, said the seven were returning from coordinating an aid shipment in central Gaza when they were killed. WCK said the following individuals died when the IDF struck their three-car convoy: Saifeddin Issam Ayab Abutaha, 25, of Palestine; Lalzawmi Frankcom, 43, of Australia; Damian Soból, 35, of Poland; Jacob Flickinger, 33, a US-Canadian dual citizen; along with UK citizens John Chapman, 57, James Henderson, 33, and James Kirby, 47.“These 7 beautiful souls were killed by the IDF in a strike as they were returning from a full day’s mission,” WCK CEO Erin Gore said Tuesday in a statement. “Their smiles, laughter, and voices are forever embedded in our memories. And we have countless memories of them giving their best selves to the world. We are reeling from our loss. The world’s loss.” The organisation noted that Abutaha, Frankcom, Soból, and Flickinger were part of WCK’s relief team, while Chapman, Henderson, and Kirby were part of the group’s security team. Monday’s killings have prompted international condemnation.UK prime minister Rishi Sunak demanded a “thorough and transparent investigation” from Israel.On Tuesday evening, Mr Sunak telephoned Benjamin Netanyahu to say that “far too many aid workers and ordinary civilians have lost their lives in Gaza” and that the situation there is “increasingly intolerable”.The White House said it was also “outraged” by the strike on workers with WCK, a charity that has been supplying food to starving Palestinians who are on the brink of famine amid Israel’s total war on the besieged strip. Zomi Frankcom (left) was killed in ther airstrike“Unfortunately over the last day there was a tragic incident of an unintended strike of our forces on innocent people in the Gaza Strip,” Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement, promising that Israeli officials were thoroughly “checking” into the incident and that the country’s armed forces “will do everything for this not to happen again”.The IDF attacked the convoy because officials believed an armed member of Hamas was traveling with the group, though no such person was traveling along with the aid workers, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports. An Israeli army source told the outlet that the strike wasn’t a matter of poor coordination, but rather because “every commander sets the rules for himself.”The charity had just offloaded 100 tonnes of food aid from a barge which sailed from Cyprus when Israel attacked their vehicle convoy on Gaza’s coastal road in Deir al-Balah. WCK said on Tuesday it was pausing all work in the occupied Palestinian territory.WCK said its convoy of three vehicles was hit despite the charity coordinating on its movements with the Israeli military, and the fact that two of the cars hit were clearly marked as aid vehicles. Damian Sobol, 35, started volunteering with WCK in the border town of Przemysl at the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of UkraineForeign secretary David Cameron called on Israel to “immediately investigate”, adding that the government wanted “a full, transparent explanation of what happened”.“This is not only an attack against WCK, this is an attack on humanitarian organisations showing up in the most dire of situations where food is being used as a weapon of war,” said Ms Gore of WCK said in a previous statement. “This is unforgivable.”Mr Soból started volunteering with WCK in the border town of Przemysl at the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine where he was helping feed refugees. He joined WCK’s response to the earthquakes in Turkey. More recently he started working for WCK in Gaza.Nate Mook, the former chief executive of WCK who first hired Ms Frankcom, described her as a “shining star” and “gift to the world” who had dedicated her life to helping people. “The news of her death, the killing of seven members of the World Central Kitchen is devastating for their families, friends and the world,” he told The Independent.“It is unfathomable that they are not with us any more. They were all truly dedicated to their work, trying to do what they could in the most desperate and dangerous of situations.”One of the destroyed vehicles from the World Central Kitchen convoy Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military’s top spokesperson, said officials were reviewing the incident at the highest level. He said an independent investigation would be launched that “will help us reduce the risk of such an event from occurring again”.WCK founder, celebrity chef Jose Andres, said the deaths were a “tragedy”. “I am heartbroken and grieving for their families and friends and our whole WCK family,” Andres wrote in a statement. “These are people – angels – I served alongside in Ukraine, Gaza, Turkey, Morocco, Bahamas, Indonesia.“They are not faceless… they are not nameless. The Israeli government needs to stop this indiscriminate killing. It needs to stop restricting humanitarian aid, stop killing civilians and aid workers, and stop using food as a weapon. No more innocent lives lost. Peace starts with our shared humanity. It needs to start now.”It is not the first time Israel has been accused of bombing humanitarian aid convoys and distribution centres and of killing humanitarian aid workers. Jamie McGoldrick, the UN’s aid coordinator for the occupied Palestinian territory, said this was “not an isolated incident” and that Gaza was one of the most dangerous places on earth for humanitarian workers. “As of 20 March, at least 196 humanitarians had been killed in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since October 2023. This is nearly three times the death toll recorded in any single conflict in a year,” he said in a statement. “Since October 2023, the OPT has become one of the world’s most dangerous and difficult places to work.” The UN’s Palestinian refugee agency told The Independent that over 170 of their staffers had been killed in the bombardment and a tank shell hit one of its aid convoys in February along the same coastal road WCK had been on. The agency said that a supply distribution centre was also hit in March, and convoys had come under Israeli fire in December. Alicia Kearns, a Conservative MP and the chair of the foreign affairs committee, said that there was still no explanation for the January bombing of the Medical Aid for Palestine complex in a declared safe zone which had also been deconflicted directly with the Israeli military. Four British doctors who were there at the time only just survived. She called for a “thorough and swift investigation” into the latest incident. “And also [into] what impact it will have on the ability of the maritime corridor to function given it is World Central Kitchen who were receiving and distributing the desperately needed aid,” she tweeted. “Humanitarian agencies must be given the assurances they need that their people will be protected.”Francesca Albanese, a UN special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories, called for sanctions on Israel. “On the day Israel bombed a foreign embassy in a third country [Syria], it also killed WCK humanitarian workers. Israel is crossing every possible red line, still with full impunity. Sanctions now. Indictments now.”It came hours after Israeli troops ended a devastating two-week raid on Gaza’s largest hospital, al-Shifa, leaving the facility a torched, gutted shell.Footage showed al-Shifa’s main buildings had been reduced to a charred mess, with what looked like flattened bodies and body parts smashed in the ground, which had been chewed up by bulldozers. Israel claimed it launched the raid on the north Gaza hospital because senior Hamas operatives had regrouped there and were planning attacks. After the troops withdrew, hundreds of Palestinians returned to search for lost loved ones or examine the damage – with Palestinian journalists reporting people had been killed by Israeli soldiers. Among the dead were Ahmed Maqadma and his mother – both doctors at al-Shifa and his cousin, said Dr Ghassan Abu Sitta, a Palestinian-British doctor who volunteered at al-Shifa and other hospitals during the first months of the war before returning to Britain. The fate of the three had been unknown since they talked by phone with family as they tried to leave al-Shifa nearly a week ago and the line suddenly went dead. On Monday, relatives found their bodies with gunshot wounds about a block from the hospital, said Abu Sitta, who is in touch with the family.  More

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      Stealth tax freeze threatens income of 1.6 million pensioners

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      Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailAlmost two million pensioners will be forced to pay income tax in the next four years due to the government’s stealth tax freeze, new research has revealed.The chancellor’s refusal to increase the £12,570 threshold when people start paying income tax – and extending it until 2028 – will see a record number of pensioners being hit with tax bills.Currently, 8.5 million pensioners pay income tax – up from roughly 4.9 million in 2010.However, analysis by the House of Commons for the Liberal Democrats has found an extra 1.6 million pensioners will be paying it within the next four years compared to if the threshold had risen with prices.Without the freeze, the allowance would have risen to £15,220 this year and up to £15,990 in 2027/28.The Lib Dems say the policy will see the Conservative party face a “reckoning at the ballot from older voters sick of being taken for granted”.Recent figures from the Department for Work and Pensions show there are currently 12.7 million people receiving the state pension. According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, over 60 per cent of these pensioners now pay income tax, up from around 50 per cent in 2010.Further analysis by the Resolution Foundation has found that the freezing on income tax thresholds will leave the average taxpaying pensioner £1,000 worse off by 2027-28.The average taxpaying pensioner will be £1,000 worse off by 2028 Liberal Democrat treasury spokesperson Sarah Olney MP said the figures were a result of Jeremy Hunt’s “pensioner punishing budget”: “These stark figures reveal the stealth tax bombshell facing pensioners under this Conservative government.“Older people who have worked hard and contributed all their lives are now being clobbered with years of unfair tax hikes.“Jeremy Hunt’s pensioner-punishing Budget will not be forgotten come the next election.”The revelations follow on from the spring Budget, which saw the government prioritise national insurance tax cuts for workers.After cutting 2 further percentage points off national insurance, Mr Hunt and Rishi Sunak indicated their goal was to abolish the tax entirely, leaving campaigners concerned that the cost of scrapping the tax would fall on the shoulders of pensioners.Both the Conservatives and Labour have now committed to keeping the state pension triple lock, meaning the state pension rises each year in line with the highest out of wage rises, inflation or 2.5 per cent. This means that the state pension is going up by 8.5 per cent this month.Baroness Altmann, a former Tory pensions minister, told the Telegraph the income tax freeze was “worrying”. “I do think it is worrying that so many more pensioners could be dragged into the tax net as the state pension may soon rise above the frozen threshold.She added: “Most of those tipped into tax will be poorer pensioners with little more than their state pension to live on. Most of them will be totally unaware of any liability and will never have filled in a tax return in their life. They are then at risk of being hit with fines and penalties for not paying a tiny amount of tax that they didn’t even know about.”A Treasury spokesperson defended the decision to freeze tax thresholds as a “difficult decision” that the government had to take, saying: “After providing hundreds of billions of pounds to protect lives and livelihoods throughout the pandemic and Putin’s energy shock, we had to take some difficult decisions to help pay it back.“Now the economy is turning a corner, we have cut National Insurance by a third, meaning that, coupled with above-inflation increases to personal tax thresholds since 2010, we have saved the average earner over £1,500 compared to what they otherwise would have paid.” More

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      Minister says being smelly shouldn’t be arrestable offence amid backlash over legislation

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      Get the free Morning Headlines email for news from our reporters across the worldSign up to our free Morning Headlines emailA minister has warned people should not arrested just because they smell amid a mounting backlash over a fiercely criticised piece of legislation which criminalises homelessness.Draft legislation for the Criminal Justice Bill seeks to criminalise “nuisance rough sleeping”, stating this includes anyone who has slept rough, is “intending to sleep rough”, or “gives the appearance” of sleeping rough and causes a nuisance while doing so.The definition of so-called “nuisance” even includes “excessive smells”. Offenders can be hit with a month in prison or fines of up to £2,500 if convicted.Education Secretary Gillian Keegan told Sky News on Tuesday she would back government policy but warned people “should not be arrested just if they smell”.She added: “I haven’t looked at that detail of it, but I guess the word is ‘excessive’, and I don’t know what they mean by that.”Her comments come as over 40 Conservative MPs are expected to rebel against elements of the controversial legislation that criminalise “nuisance” rough sleepers.It comes after leading housing charities recently told The Independent they fear measures criminalising homelessness in the Criminal Justice Bill could hit women hardest.The new legislation, expected to become law before the general election, includes vague ill-defined measures that mean sleeping in doorways or hidden spots could be defined as nuisance behaviour and therefore criminalised. Campaigners are fearful women could be worst hit due to the fact they often seek out hidden spots to protect themselves from sexual violence, harassment and other dangers when sleeping on the streets.A former rough sleeper recently told The Independent about her experience of being homeless on and off from the age of 16 until her forties as she branded the bill a “Dickensian” piece of legislation.“It’s a disgrace,” the now 54-year-old said. “If the government thinks the way to end homelessness is to outlaw it, then they are not facing the issue of homelessness. To say, ‘you look homeless, so I’m going to arrest you’ – that is leaving the police with an untold amount of power to just arrest anybody that they like.”Former home secretary Suella Braverman – who provoked criticism when she referred to rough sleeping as a “lifestyle choice” – introduced the legislation to parliament.Senior government sources say the bill has been put on hold while ministers consult with MPs from both the left and right of the Tory Party who have raised fears about the proposals, The Times reports.Bob Blackman, a Tory MP for Harrow East, has tabled measures to ensure the government meets its initial pledge to repeal the 1824 Vagrancy Act.The Criminal Justice Bill has been branded as “the Vagrancy Act 2.0 on steroids” by senior Lib Dem MP Layla Moran – in reference to the intensely criticised 200-year-old piece of legislation.While parliament voted to repeal the Vagrancy Act in February 2022, this has not yet come into force, and the advent of the Criminal Justice Bill signifies a U-turn from the government given the draconian measures included in the legislation. More

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      Labour ‘would sell arms to Israel’ if it ‘abides by humanitarian law’, says shadow minister

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      Labour “would sell arms to Israel” if it “abides by humanitarian law”, a shadow minister has said.Speaking to Kay Burley on Sky News on Tuesday, 2 April, Pat McFadden said the opposition party “doesn’t have a boycott of selling arms to Israel.”However, if they were in charge, Mr McFadden said selling arms was “something we would do” if it were believed Israel was “abiding by international humanitarian law”.On whether he believed Israel was following international law, Mr McFadden said: “If there’s proper legal evidence that they aren’t, the Government should come out and say so. More

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      Listen: Sunak squirms at BBC local radio presenter’s grilling on general election

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      Rishi Sunak laughed at a BBC local radio presenter’s questioning as she grilled the prime minister on when this year’s general election will be.The PM burst into laughter when BBC Radio Tees’ Amy Oakden asked him to name the date, declaring he had “answered that question many times in the last few weeks” but refused to confirm when the vote would be.During the grilling, Ms Oakden pressed Mr Sunak on why he found her question funny.“There’s a way that we’d announce general elections and it would be done in the formal and official way,” Mr Sunak responded. More

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      Veteran Irish politician Simon Coveney steps down as a new leader prepares to take charge

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      Sign up to our free Brexit and beyond email for the latest headlines on what Brexit is meaning for the UKSign up to our Brexit email for the latest insight Enterprise Minister Simon Coveney, one of Ireland’s highest-profile government members, announced Tuesday he is stepping down from the government ahead of the election of a new national leader.Coveney, 51, developed a high international profile when he served as Ireland’s foreign minister between 2017 and 2022 during the turmoil over the U.K.’s departure from the European Union. Brexit had huge implications for Ireland, an EU member that shares a border with the U.K.’s Northern Ireland.Coveney has been minister for enterprise, trade and employment since December 2022.Prime Minister Leo Varadkar stepped down last month as head of the center-right Fine Gael party, part of Ireland’s coalition government, for “personal and political” reasons.His replacement, 37-year-old Simon Harris, is due to be confirmed as Ireland’s youngest prime minister, or taoiseach, next week by Ireland’s parliament, the Dail.Coveney, a member of Fine Gael, said on social network X that he’d told Harris “that I would not be making myself available to serve in cabinet when the Dail resumes next week.”Coveney told Irish broadcaster RTE that stepping aside would make it easier for Harris “to promote new talent in the party.”He said he plans to remain in parliament as the lawmaker for Cork South Central. More